- gardens and the gardening life

[Guest guest]

Ahhh, you are living my dream, lol. I used to live on a beautiful farm and I

miss it today.

The hubby does not even want to entertain any idea of living in the country,

sigh. But I

do my little gardening here in my little home. We do well, not as much surplus,

but enough

for enjoyment.

I enjoyed you sharing your lovely life...good way to start my Sunday morning.

________________________________

To: fibromyalgiacured

Sent: Sunday, December 11, 2011 5:52 AM

Subject: RE: for - gardens and the gardening life

 

Yep, similar weather pattern, but I'm a ways north in SW Missouri. Our drought

and heat weren't as bad as yours but definitely posed problems. Hay's in short

supply and expensive, and even though I stocked in my usual extra cushion, we

had to start feeding it much earlier than normal and will run out by the end of

Feb. if I can't find and buy more.

Most years I garden through the winter inside 16 x 60 unheated hoophouse. It

stretches the growing season so I can have tomatoes and such much earlier and

later and greens and root crops through the winter BUT we haven't quite solved

the problem of the fall heat, which has been bad the last couple of years. This

year's a bit of a different experiment to see what happens with the volunteer

seedlings I left in place after allowing last winter's crops to go to seed in

there. I'll go back to a more planned and controlled winter garden after this

experiment, though armed with a bit more information that allows me to better

work with the natural cycles.

I said before I'd been gardening since childhood, but what I didn't say then was

that was in clay or clay-loam soils until 6 years ago. Now we have sandy loam,

and very different drainage patterns, and we're further south and at least a

half-zone warmer. Thus I'm still adapting.

>>>I am beginning to feel so much better as long as I stick to the naturals.

That's been my experience, and it's the primary reason we bought this farm. My

husband still works 3 hours away in a large city, and during the week he stays

at our old place near the city. I've been living on the farm full-time since

2005 and have a huge garden every year and raise most of our meat. The holiday

parties aren't such a challenge for me here since I've a circle of mostly

like-minded friends, at least as far as the natural foods are concerned. Some

are neighbors and friends of neighbors, and we all watch out for one another.

Others I met through our organics buying club - private and growing co-op we

formed to allow us to buy directly from the warehouses instead of driving 2-3

hours to the nearest viable health food markets.

Since moving to the farm, my health's improved tremendously - still work lots of

hours via telecommute but I'm away from people and their artificially scented

products, can work my PT in as needed, and get lots of exercise because no

matter how badly I feel on any given day, I HAVE to get out and take care of the

animals. As all of you know, movement is essential to managing fibro, and the

animals get me moving, even if only out of the guilt I'd feel if I neglected

them even a little bit. Also, it's easier to control food, temptations, etc.,

being miles out in the country with no stores handy to shop off cravings. And

thus, one small step at a time, I've changed a lot of bad habits and lost 50

pounds since I've been here.

And that doesn't even begin to touch upon the philosophical reasons for living

here, growing food, etc. or the spiritual benefits, which do tie back to the

fibro healing.

P